The post-season – how to get it right

Well it has been a while but I finally have a few minutes to put pen to paper. I should be at the Lido but my first cold in years has me sitting at home instead with a hot cuppa and a couple of paracetamol.

Matt Dixon of Purple Patch Fitness is a fantastic coach whose principles and ideas make a lot of sense to me. He recently wrote an article for Triathlete Europe magazine titled ‘Nailing the Post-Season’. Here are a few key points that I took from the article that might also help you.

The post season is ‘The bridge of training time between the end of one season and the serious pre-conditioning of the subsequent season‘. The post-season is not a period of inactivity or a period in which you let your fitness regress. By the end of the post-season you should be ready to progress into a pre-season conditioning phase feeling re-energised and ready to follow a planned progressive training program for the remainder of the season.

It is worth looking back on the season that has just been before looking forward to the next. Ask yourself the following questions:

High run volume focus – a post-season marathon does not necessarily equate to better run performances next season.

Low swimming focus – most triathletes will tell you their swim is their biggest weakness.

There are plenty of coaches and athletes who would argue that a high run volume focus and a low swim volume focus is perfectly acceptable. For some athletes it may be. If you are prone to running related injuries and are a relatively weak swimmer then then it makes sense to focus on your swim during this period and improve your ability to cope the physical demands of running through functional strength and short but frequent run training.

It is well worth reading the full article in the November issue of Triathlete Europe. So what do you think? By the way, that is my identical twin brother (Nathan) in the photo on the front page. See you Sunday, Tim (LFTC Coach).

Good question, there are a number of variables you should consider. Perhaps the most obvious being the date and nature of your last race of the season and the date and nature of the first race of the next season. A late season long distance event will obviously require a significant period of time to recover from. In addition it is important to think about accumulated fatigue in a more general sense i.e. not just training fatigue, and previous experience. Triathletes who have been playing this game for a number of seasons may me able to ‘recover’ with a shorter post-season. I would suggest 8-12 weeks would be sufficient for most athletes. Sorry about the late reply! Tim (LFTC Coach)